14. Glory to the Cock!

English > The novel > Annotations per chapter > Chapter 14

Eight bottles of dry white Ai-Danil

Ai-Danil is a white wine from the Crimea (Ukraine). I never tried it myself, but in March 2004, a bottle Ai-Danil Furmint-Harslevelu, vintage 1892, was sold by auction for 2.466 English pounds in Londen.


The vent-pane Fortochka

The vent-pane is a so-called форточка (fortochka). It’s a small window in the bigger window for the purpose of ventilation. These fortochkas are extremely practical in the Russian winter, when one wants some ventilation without opening the entire double window.


With the third crowing of the cock

Bulgakov interweaves the theme of vampires being afraid of the dawn with the biblical story of Peter’s denial. (Matthew 26:69-75; Mark 14:66-73; Luke 22:54-62; John 18:25-27).


The movie theatre

There was and still is a movie theater at the place where Rimsky takes the taxi. It is situated along the Garden Ring at Triumfalnaya Square no. 3, right across the Variety Theatre. First it was called Khanzhonkov, then it changed into Mephrabpom, then Gorn, then Moskva. This is still its name, but today it is also known again as the Khanzhonkov’s House Cinema. It is one of the few theatres to show only Russian-made films.

This movie theatre with 500 seats was created in 1913 by the famous film director Alexander Alekseevich Khanzhonkov (1877-1945).


Leningrad station Leningrad vokzal

If there ever was a glass vault or cupola in the Leningrad station, then it is no longer there. Substantial reconstructions in the late Soviet days have altered the form of all but the front of the station today.

Video

The chaos created by Woland at the Variety Theatre is also shown in the TV-series Master i Margarita by director Vladimir Bortko from 2005.

Your webmaster subtitled this TV-series in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian and Dutch. The DVD with those subtitles is available in our webshop.

Click here to order the DVD Master i Margarita



Share this page |